Choose Kindness, Nonetheless Choose Wisely Posted by:Rocco--Friday, November 19, 2010

Choose Kindness, Nonetheless Choose Wisely

While looking for something else I found two short but good articles on kindness.

The first by Dr. Twerski is about when acts of kindness are actually harmful and the need to exercise “tough love”.

The second by Dr. Elisha Goldstein is about not being kind enough to yourself. I have experienced this and have seen it in many of the parents at our meetings.

Despite all of the “would of’s”, “should of’s”, “could of’s” and “what if’s” we beat ourselves up with; "The facts are true, we can’t go back and change those, however, the barrage of judgments and self blame simply serves no beneficial purpose and are just not facts."


Kindness, Reconsidered

By Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, M.D.

There are certain types of kindness which require very careful analysis. The determination of the effectiveness of these types of kindness should be made by consulting a competent authority rather than by relying on one's own judgment.

There are times when what may seem to be acts of kindness are actually harmful.

A classic example is one which I encounter regularly in my work in treating addiction, when people who try to be "kind" to the addict actually encourage his addiction.

Thus, parents who continue to give their child money, even though he is using drugs, are hardly being kind to him.

The family member who covers the debts of an addictive gambler in order to avoid his going to jail for fraud is not being kind to him.

The person who uses his influence to extricate a friend from a drunk-driving charge is not being kind to him.

In all such instances, one may think he is doing the subject a favor, while by relieving him of the unpleasant consequences of his addictive behavior; he is actually removing the distress which might bring the person to his senses and make him aware of the need for help to overcome his addiction.

In our profession we must often recommend "tough love," which is similar to the love of a mother who has her infant child immunized.

She indeed allows the doctor to hurt the child with an injection, and she knows that the infant will suffer 48 hours of fever and misery, but because of her true love of her child, she allows him to be hurt to protect him from crippling and deadly diseases.

This is a prototype for "tough love." How foolish it would be if a mother wished to "protect" her child from the painful ordeal of immunization, and thereby put him at serious risk of developing untreatable diseases!

Such "kindness" is certainly misguided, and is anything but kindness.
We must be careful that the kindness we do is not of the kind that promotes harm.

Inasmuch as we are invariably emotionally involved with a loved one, we should seek objective counseling, to make sure that we are not blinded by our emotions to the degree that we engage in misguided kindness.

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, M.D. is a psychiatrist and ordained rabbi. He is the founder of the Gateway Rehabilitation Center in Pittsburgh, a leading center for addiction treatment. An Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, he is a prolific author, with some 62 books to his credit.

Copyright © 2010 Artscroll Mesorah Publications

Parents: Are Your Regrets Fact or Fiction?

by Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D. Updated: Nov 16th 2010

It could possibly be the most common reaction when parents look back on the lives of their children and think that they could’ve done more, they could’ve done better.

Parents see their child’s challenges in life as their own failings in some way, but don’t seem to understand a very basic understanding that we all do the best we can at the time with what we have.

This isn’t to absolve responsibility but is meant to incline us toward self-forgiveness. The truth is, the thoughts that fly through our minds get confusing and they can become entirely convincing and believable, but it’s important to separate fact from fiction so we can break free from the thoughts that lead to greater stress, anxiety and depression.

Below is a list of facts I’ve heard from parents and the corresponding fiction below:

Fact

“I was depressed when my child was an infant and I wasn’t able to give him the attention he wanted.”

“My teenager is into drugs and alcohol.”

“When my child was young he didn’t do well in school and got into fights.”

Fiction

“I was a horrible mother or father.”

“I am a failure as a parent.”

“I could have done more; I could have given more, what is wrong with me.”

The facts may be true, but that doesn’t mean you could have acted different.

Maybe you were depressed at the time or working to make ends meet.

Maybe, like many of us, you didn’t get the "Ultimate Rule Book for Being a Parent" and so made some mistakes along the way.

Maybe one minor thing that isn’t being taken into consideration is the enormous effects friends have on children’s lives.

The ultimate fact is: you couldn’t have done anything different because you weren’t aware of what you wished was different until after they happened.

It serves no purpose to blame or judge ourselves for a past under the delusion that hindsight could have been applied back then.

However, we can begin a process of healing; forgiving ourselves for any harm we may have caused our children knowing that we likely were suffering at that time as well. We are in need of compassion all around.

The facts are true, we can’t go back and change those, however, the barrage of judgments and self blame simply serves no beneficial purpose and are just not facts.

As always, please share your thoughts, stories and questions below. Your interaction provides a living wisdom for us all to benefit from.

For this article and others by Dr. Goldstein click on the following link:

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=41138&cn=82

Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D.
A blog about mindfulness, stress-reduction, psychotherapy and mental health at MentalHelp.net

Copyright © CenterSite, LLC, 1995-2010

“Never underestimate the power that comes with simply having a choice, nor the personal power we feel once we've decided what our choice will be.

Viktor Frankl discovered this truth in Auschwitz. The camp inmates were beaten, starved, deprived of sleep, worked beyond endurance, humiliated, hated, and massacred.

Yet, as Frankl tells us in “Man's Search for Meaning”, not even the desperately cruel conditions of a concentration camp could take away "the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

His conclusion is that "Fundamentally, any man can...decide what shall become of him -- mentally and spiritually."

There is no greater power than this, and this is the power that choosing kindness gives us.”

Copyright © 2003 by Margot Silk Forrest

"Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

- Viktor E. Frankl